Power Changes and Self-Respect

A Comparison of Two Cases of Established-Outsider Relations

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2353635
AutoresBram Van Stolk (autor correspondente), C Wouters (0000-0003-4183-7790)
Ano1987
Volume4
Fascículo2-3
Páginas477-488
Data de publicação1987-06-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoTheory Culture & Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0263-2764 • E-ISSN: 1460-3616
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/026327687004002015
OpenAlexW2133055680
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas17
Referências citadas4

This article is based on two studies of outsiders in an emancipation process. 1)The first one deals with homosexuals (van Stolk and de Regt, 1979), and the second with women (van Stolk and Wouters, 1983); both studies were carried out in a social service organization.Most of the homosexuals sought counselling because of difficulties in accepting themselves; they suffered from a lack of self-respect.The women, predominantly working-class, had been taken into a crisis centre after having run away from their partners.In doing so most of them had given way to pressure due to an increase in self-respect; in effect they could no longer tolerate the way they had been treated.The problems of both the homosexuals and the runaway women are examined in the context of a decreasing inequality of power in the relations between homosexuals and heterosexuals, and between men and women respectively.With the help of Norbert Elias's established-outsider theory, the relation between women and men is compared to that between homosexuals and heterosexuals.The main focus is on the connection between changes in their mutual balance of power, in the respect shown them socially and in their self-respect.The comparison is preceded by a short survey of the main conclusions of the two empirical studies. HomosexualsIn the course of life people become attached to certain future expectations.From early childhood they develop, partly unawares, ideas and ideals about their future position with regard to others, and the respect it will bring.Later these ideas become elaborated and modelled according to the new demands that others make, or appear to be making of them.The struggle to realize these cherished hopes gives meaning to life.Those who fail inevitably become trapped between reality and the ideals they have set themselves.They grow dissatisfied with themselves; in their own eyes they are no longer respected by others, and consequently they lose self-respect.The ideal self-image always embraces elementary images of 'real men' and 'real women'.Whatever the appearance of these real men and women, they are never homosexual!Children have no opportunity to become acquainted with images of a future life as a

Context (archaeology · Emancipation · Inequality · Political science · Power (physics · Relation (database · Sociology · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Crime, Deviance, and Social Control · Gender Studies · Law · Mathematics · Psychology · Social Psychology · Sociology and Norbert Elias